Is this still a medium or am I old?
Anyone else feel aimless? (I ask this as though one single person will see it/read it/respond/care?...but just go with me.)
I, per usual, am steeped in nostalgia. I just spent the better part of my night listening to Little Earthquakes by Tori Amos, followed by Ray of Light by Madonna. I’ve been watching old movies like Mystic Pizza and re-watching early seasons of Real Housewives of NY, doing it all from my bed, on my computer instead of the relatively new, nice, big TV downstairs. It’s as if I’m 20s Alison, alone in my apartment in New York, watching tapes of recorded-from-tv episodes of Friends and Sex and the City on my 12″ TV/VCR combo, purchased in 1996 when I went to college. It’s purposeful, in a way. I’m indulging. I’m going back to 20s Alison—even teenage Alison, watching TV at one in the morning when I couldn’t sleep, discovering Fiona Apple on MTV or laughing at first-season episodes of Saturday Night Live from before I was born. I have these comforts; music and media that touches a part of me that is stuffed away from the rest of myself. The part that felt the promise of the future. The part that had time to sit in that promise and that hope. Time to feel every bit of sadness, drama, anger, self-righteousness, self-loathing, ambition, heartbreak and, despite it all, optimism. There was so much time. It was safe. It was heavy, but it wasn’t real.
Or I just didn’t realize how real it could get.
I’ve wanted to write into this void many times over the last few years. Whenever I’ve attempted, I usually get caught up reading old posts; connecting with a part of my life from 15 years ago, for which I’m grateful there’s documentation. My early days of my marriage, my time before kids, my time with babies—really, my last time as only me. Again, there was time. Now it’s five minutes here and there...the rest tied up in tasks and life that is decidedly much less self-indulgent. There is no time to create anew. There is time to reread/relive/remember. Nostalgia is a drug for 40s Alison. It allows me to feel. And I feel so much.
I can’t quite articulate the emotions that bubble up when I listen to music or watch shows/movies that I connected to deeply—or even not that deeply. I don’t recall being super into Little Earthquakes, yet I can experience teenage Alison listening to it...feeling every bit of Me and a Gun despite not knowing any version of that kind of violence (even still, thank god). And tonight, after listening to that and Ray of Light, I dabbled in watching old Janet Jackson videos, namely for If. I had to see that iconic dance. I had to relive the wonder of watching Janet, gorgeous as ever, doing a dance I would pause and rewind and freeze frame and slow-mo for hours trying to learn. The nostalgia drug reminded me—I was a kid once. I was a kid who spent hoooooouuuuuuurrrrrrrs dancing. I was a teenager who took herself and the dances she choreographed way too seriously. I was not that good of a dancer, but goddamnit I believed I could be Janet.
I’m 44 now. I’m tired. I’m decidedly middle-aged. I was at Georgia’s dance recital today, watching my now eleven year old on stage. I sat next to a young mom, squealing in delight at her tiny daughter doing ballet in front of an audience. I was that young mom with her tiny daughter at her first recital eight years ago. Where did it go? Why don’t I remember enough of it? Why do I miss it so much?
How has it gotten so hard to keep time?
I want to write more music. I want to interview people I find interesting and find out where their time goes. I want to sit and do nothing. I want to do more. I want to do something that counts. I want to do something meaningful. I want to do things right and well. I want to make my family proud. I want to be present. I want to be anywhere but here. i want to be alone. I want to be with people. i want to be responsible for myself. I want a puppy. I want to teach my kids every possible life lesson.
I want. I want. I want.
Where to begin?